


The Girl Above the Mantel

by wtfrasers



Category: Outlander & Related Fandoms, Outlander (2008), Outlander (TV), Outlander Series - Diana Gabaldon
Genre: Bisexual Female Character, Bisexuality, F/F, Lesbian Character, Outlander - Freeform, fuck fronk, gays of the ridge, just two pretty best friends, not carpet munchers, queerlander chronicles, rogers dead, they were roommates, we have to find her
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-09
Updated: 2021-02-09
Packaged: 2021-03-15 02:48:52
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,839
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29306793
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wtfrasers/pseuds/wtfrasers
Summary: A Dragonfly in Amber-esque WLW Bree oneshot set beyond Book 8, featuring her adult children and the woman who opened her eyes to love, solace, and congruence.
Comments: 9
Kudos: 21
Collections: QueerlanderChronicles





	The Girl Above the Mantel

**Author's Note:**

> I want to start by saying I am so proud of this little thing! Ignore that this notes section is a whole ass reverse eulogy. 
> 
> My writing confidence has grown so much since I started A Hopeless Place fic with my co-writer / co-creator / co-parent friend Erin @AlienOutlander. They are such an incredible writer who challenges me in the best ways. With Erin came the support of the Whores Brunch ladies and for the first time my words felt seen and heard and felt. 
> 
> Soooo I am happy to present this wee solo work and show myself from behind the green curtain... Oz anyone...?? haha. Thank you, Erin for being the most Alpha beta!
> 
> Thank you to Michaela and Anya for your brilliant "Queer Outlander Chronicles fanfiction" idea that got us here to begin with and for trusting me with "The Gathering" of us. 
> 
> Thank you to Ryia for your heart and mind! Your pure hearted genius with the Gays of the Ridge page idea and our partnership has lifted my spirit so much recently. 
> 
> Thank you Phoebe for being a flash of comedic relief whenever your name comes my way! So many of my much needed smiles and laughs have come from random unexpected things you tweet or say in GC that catch me off guard. I appreciate you for that.
> 
> Thank you, Jacki. Thank you for your attentive ears and always open arms. You are a warmth.
> 
> Elin, you've made this easy. Thank you for being.

**The Girl Above the Mantel**

_ January 2001 Brianna Fraser MacKenzie, Age 53 _

I had never seen Lallybroch such a wreck. _No_ , I had. The day we had scouted the property for purchase, twenty years prior. Ancient Fraser hands had tilled the land and raised stone to form a Laird’s home, brick by brick. Just so, the Fraser spirit had kept the now-abandoned _Broch Turrach_ from withering away in Highland weather, long enough for Roger and I to reclaim it.

From the day we arrived, in 1980, our family had grown to fill these grand halls with our children, who grew to invite their dates who later became their spouses; my son and daughter in-law, and the parents of my grandchildren, who I now nagged for running up and down the same staircase their 280 year old great grandfather had three lifetimes before.

The house grew both too big and too small when death’s rattle arrived with a rap at the door to take Roger home. There’s no way in hell I could stay any longer, surrounded and alone. I couldn’t remember the funeral; I only remembered wanting to pack up this fucking house and move. Jem and Mandy had obliged, not tempting my hormonal grief with the chance of an argument, and the movers arrived the very next day. And so, there I sat at Granda Brian’s desk swirling a dram of too-strong whisky - _Oh, Mama, how did you do it?_ \- watching from his office as my family room was ushered into the moving truck by buffoons.

That’s when I thought I’d hit the floor. _She_ hit the floor.

“No!”

I was too late. The large canvas had slipped from the oaf’s grip when he lifted it and a corner of the fabric she had stretched and bound herself caught on a nail in the wall. The scream shredded through my throat in time with the metal tearing through her reimagined face. She hit the floor, the wooden corners that framed her splintering into pieces. And so did I; the cracking of my heart a more penetrating sound than the muffled footsteps that came towards me before everything went black.

***

“Mama, why all the fuss over a painting, though? I know it’s been in the home all these years, but it isna going anywhere the rest of yer things aren’t, surely?” Jem stood before me, trying to make sense of the scene I’d just made.

We sat at the kitchen table, warm cuppa in hand, and I could swear I was receiving a scolding from my Da. Mandy made herself busy in the cupboards; she had brewed the tea herself, a Granny Claire recipe. If it weren’t for the visible wear in my hands, the annual growth rings that reveal a tree’s true age, I would have thought she was Mama; hair dark and wild about her as she nurtured in her own disconnected way before I invited her to hold me. _What the fuck was going on?_

“It’s not just a portrait, Jeremiah.” I finally said, too frustrated and too damn confused to offer him more.

My sweet Mandy cupped my hands with hers as they held on for dear life to the heat and tangibility of the mug. Then every thought her lips had held tightly between her teeth was set loose to fly freely. And fast.

“Do tell us what ye can, Mama, because I can’t help but think the girl is not as random as I thought all this time. Was she a close friend of yours? Is she family? A secret sister? _Another?_ Has she died? Och, I’m so sorry that was rude. Did Da know her?”

_For fucks sake._

“Amanda!”

_Thank you, Jemmy._

“I really can’t do this right now, it’s all too much.” The equivalent to the ostensible _I’m tired._ I’d said it but wasn’t sure how much I‘d actually meant it; having not allowed myself the thought of her in years, still, I felt her with me daily. She was kept close for a reason. Screaming for her was the most I’d felt in over a decade, and I had been numb all week.

“She’s hysterical, Mandy, just let her rest.”

_Now he’s done it._

“What’s with men thinking fed up women are crazy? Mama, ye have a story to tell. I know ye do. Set her free.”

I looked into the mirror of her matching indigo eyes, tear-glazed with sincerity, while my own began to sharpen with clarity. Without another thought to stop me, I let the key settle into the blood-stained lock in my chest and released my soul.

“Her name was Gayle.”

***

_ August 1966 Brianna Randall, Age 18 _

History surrounded me, but it was the work of fine hands that drew my attention. The taking apart and putting together of pieces to form a whole; the many that become the one. She used her entire body to stretch and bind a canvas. It took everything within my own body to simply watch and sketch her as the piercing light of evening made bronze of her skin and glitter of the blood that moved through her veins. She radiated emotional intelligence, comfort, and a feminine strength that made me long for the warmth of a woman. Gayle was a goddess and I was glad to be under her reign.

“You know, you sketch in those tiny diaries but never make them big enough for anyone to actually see,” her voice came to me from behind the large canvas as she stood and admired the fruit of her labor.

“I do know. That’s exactly the point, Gayle.” I stood from my position, adjacent to her on our dorm room floor, and sat on my bed. How an art major came to be a history major’s roommate, I’ll never know, but I thanked _whoever_ was responsible, daily.

“Use one of my canvases. _Please_ , use one of my canvases,” she begged as she made her way over to me, legs nearly as long as mine and torso slender beneath her tank top. We had both made a habit of roaming the room in nothing but our knickers and tops… as girls tend to do. “Sketch something on canvas for me and I’ll paint my version of it for you. C’mon, it’ll be fun.” She leaned in between my legs, resting her chin at the edge of her palms, elbows on the mattress between my thighs, and let her gaze float between my eyes and my lips. I leaned forward, all panic hidden from my face, as I squinted into her glare and raised one rust colored brow.

“Wouldn’t you love to see yourself in color, you bloody narcissist.” My wide-lipped smirk betrayed the facade of friendship. _She felt it, too._

“I’m not one for self portraits and you know it, Bree. You’ve never seen one from me and you never will.”

“Except, if I sketch you, you’ll paint yourself for me.”

And that’s when Gayle kissed me.

She closed the gap between us causing me to both lose my breath and inhale every living color for the very first time. Kissing her felt like finally _being_ kissed. A difference I hadn’t even realized existed. She took the time to taste me, lingering on my lower lip, slipping her tongue in deeper than just the inviting first swipe. If a lick were a summons, she offered me a full proposal to suck her soul into my mouth - and I did. Taking the time to enjoy the slick texture of her tongue rolling under and over mine was almost enough, until the vignette filter on my tunnel vision widened.

Nevermind her mouth - her _face!_ Her beautiful face on mine was so _smooth_ and, as I let my hands roam the ledge of hip that led to leg, I learned that _everything_ about her body sang _soft._ All feelings unexperienced until then were exploding behind my eyes like stars at the end of their life cycle: growing, transforming, expanding, collapsing, then starting over again. Loving Gayle was like finally falling in love with myself.

***

_ January 1967 _

“Let it be, Gayle,” I continued unpacking, mindlessly folding and unfolding clothes from my suitcase as we settled into our new semester dorm. We had requested to be roommates long before we stopped speaking to each other in December. A rookie mistake. There we were, the occasion for the momentary dissolution of _us_ picking up right where we left it a month ago.

“Why do you have to care what people think? Especially with a mother as radical as yours. There’s no way she would mind us, Brianna.”

“Mama is in her own world. And Daddy... Daddy would die just thinking about me- _ugh._ ” He was far from a practicing catholic _\- Hell, Mama visited the church more than he did -_ so religion was not the matter. He loved me, and still there were ways Daddy made his opinions covert, but clear enough for me to never be _me_.

_These movements. The homosexuals. The blacks. All suddenly in your face. Yes, congratulations, you’ve existed like everyone else in bloody history. I just don’t want it forced on me._

Gayle’s eyes were pleading with me, begging me to fight back, to prove her wrong, “You disgust yourself now? Is that it? What a peculiar flower you must be, Brianna Randall, to blossom in darkness and perish by light.”

I stormed out of the room instead, taking my pain and fury for a run in Boston’s blistering cold, and when I returned we had moved on forever.

***

_ January 2001 _

Those were the last words she’d said to give me the chance to change my mind, but I couldn’t. That New Year and every year after that had been spent confined to the regression of mere friendship.

Due to my newfound understanding _\- and consequently further lack thereof -_ of time travel, my perspective had changed and my time with Gayle had become just that: a moment in a collection of times; at least, that’s what I told myself. We’d managed to keep in touch until fathers died, stones cried, ships sailed, weddings were held, babies were bred, blood was bled and true fathers were met. I had lived multiple lives, in so many times, and was no longer the girl she knew.

Denial in full force, I’d held Gayle at a comfortable enough distance so that, when my belongings were released from storage and brought to our not-so-new home at Lallybroch, I’d dusted off her painting, called her an anonymous work of art to be admired, and set her on the family room wall above a mantelpiece. She simply belonged with me.

***

Mandy and Jemmy sat at the kitchen table, mouths agape, eyes too slow for the teleprompters in their minds to offer anything substantial to say.

I got up slowly, deciding to fix supper and return to life as I knew it, when their harmonious voices called me back to what I wished was only a dream.

“Mama, we have to find her.”


End file.
